Sunday, November 24, 2013

This letter was published in an abridged form in the Sunday Star Times today November 24 , 2013.

With the announcement that Clifford Bay, Marlborough will not become the Ferry Port was universally acclaimed. For fifteen years the proposal to shift the port from Picton had hindered future planning and much needed investment.

Colin Espiner in the Sunday Star-Times of Sunday 17 applauded this decision and called the line to be funded.

My thoughts are expressed in this letter to the Sunday Star-Times.

The
thirty year commitment to Picton as the South island terminal port
provides certainty and real opportunity. Colin Espiner’s feature brings
back pleasant memories of public service, constant challenges and
aspirations about what the Interisland line should be.

Public
transport advocates, tourism bodies, railwaymen, seafarers and unions
have long advocated for a high quality ferry service across Cook Strait.
Espiner’s call for this service to be funded accordingly is music to
their ears.

Last year was the fiftieth anniversary of Cook Strait rail ferry services.

Profits
have been taken by state and private owners, the mentality being it was
a freight service and passengers were an afterthought is like a
curate’s egg. One thing that is constant is the professionalism of the
crews.

The
stewards who served me and attended to my comforts when I recently
travelled on the Kaitaki may not have been burly Englishmen as Espiner
remembers, but I was confident in an emergency they would excel as the
Wahine did.

The
Interisland Line must be profitable. To be so, it must be funded not
bled by owners or undercapitalised .These two diseases have plagued the
line. Colin Espiner’s feature is timely and correct.

Friday, November 22, 2013

Bunning's proposed and now resource-consented building on Arch Hill is as popular as rotting fish. Residents are organising meetings and the media are responding to the Arch Hillresidents' concern. The scribes are busy, too, and letters and articles are being published. This letter of mine was published today Saturday 23, November, 2013 in The New Zealand Herald entitled Lost Treasure

Is the super city really working for local communities?

We are being done-over like a dog’s dinner. Many are
concerned about the pace that things are moving and that we are losing control over
the things that we treasure. Who can or will stand up our communities and who
will take the fight?

We are losing precious gems. The infamous Aurora hotel
decision saw the owners being given a green light to super profits and a bonus
knocking shop on Karangahape Road.
If this council and our local board are at all serious about our built
heritage, they should have imposed ten year moratorium on the Chow brothers’ development.
This would have sent a clear message to the opportunists and cowboys who care little
about are how we live in this city.
Ponsonby residents have lost in resource consent hearings to the development at
221 Ponsonby Road, and also are fighting for the proposed public park at 254
Ponsonby Road.

Now we have Bunning’s development forced on to the Arch Hill community. This is
a travesty and makes a mockery of our mayor's dream of Auckland being the most liveable
city. Will the mayor stand up this time?

Sunday, November 17, 2013

The comments below was published in the November issue of the Ponsonby News . I have received a number of phone calls and emails from folk including a number who are political party members of all shades who share my concern that the election tactics that were used aginst me were unwarranted and in the words of one down right nasty .

Many commented that we are lucky to have the Ponsonby News as it provided for residents of the Waitemata ward the best election coverage . Again thanks to the Ponsonby News for this public service.

I
would like to thank the Ponsonby News for excellent local election content.
Without their stories and analysis the voters would know little about the
candidates for the local ward.

All
who run for public office are entitled to respect for offering themselves and
as a community we should encourage people to run and we all should vote.
Of note are the independents. They do not have the resources,
the brand of the political machines. I know now how challenging it is to run as
one.

This
was compounded by the faceless and spineless folk who rang claiming to be local
media, and complained to council and the returning offices about minor mistakes
on flyers and holdings. Unfortunately this distracted from meaningful debate
over local issues.

These
tactics are of political apparatchiks’ from the cold war and have no place in
local government campaigns.

Putting all into context the 2340 people who voted me I really appreciate and thank them their support

I
congratulate all the successful candidates and may they put local into local
and community into community.

Tuesday, November 5, 2013

There has been much comment and emotion about a monument to a paramilitary force known as Massey Cossacks being put on the Auckland waterfront .
I wrote to the New Zealand Herald. in response to this controversy and also as an attempt to explain why such a monument is contentious and should not be on the Auckland waterfront.
This letter was published Friday, I November , 2013 and was entitled Waterfront Memorial .

Massey’s Cossacks are recorded in our history .What is forgotten is they were the forerunners of the Black and Tans
the paramilitary force unleashed by Britain on the Irish populace six years later.
That is why their memory is so offensive
to many New Zealanders. Would the Irish tolerate a memorial to The Black and
Tans in the republic?

They are the true comparison.
I agree with your letter writer John Walsh that we should not sanitise our history
but we must know it first.

Before the Cossacks were organised things were reasonably
calm. There had been a peaceful march from Ponsonby through
Freemans Bay led by Michael Joseph Savage with the banner If Blood be the Price of Your cursed Wealth. We have bought it Fair.

Massey replaced Police Commissioner Mitchell
with his friend and fellow Orangemen Cullen then mayhem happened. The Cossacks
raged and violence followed .

These were not good old boys riding in to Wellington and Auckland
to give the wharfies a biff. They were armed
by the state, organised and in Auckland barracked in the Domain. One of their
billy clubs sits above the bar of the Northern Club in Auckland. That is their memorial.

Friday, October 4, 2013

It is fantastic news that state support for Team New Zealand has been announced. The America's Cup is far more than a rich man's yacht race for New Zealand.

Owning The Great Ponsonby ArtHotel and hosting America's Cup fans, boat buyers and investors we are well qualified to comment on the real value of the America's Cup.

It is far, far more important. The original America's Cup defence was a transformation for the New Zealand marine industry and continues to be so today. It also was a positive step in our nation's character development . Our confidence surged and again this serves us well today.

The Fonterra debacle which is heading to European courts and has the potential to damage New Zealand Inc. would have thrown us once and our media would be full of doom and gloom.

With the confidence we developed with the America's Cup victory and successful defence we as people are better able to cope with these challenges.

Rod Oram's column below celebrates this It is also the part of the narrative of our industrialism and our innovation.

Rod Oram’s Sunday Star column of September 22, 2013 The
Year of the Cat has made a 21st century clarion call for nation
building. He writes “an even bigger challenge for
Emirates Team New Zealand is to make New Zealand the global epicentre for its
powerful technologies and skills”.

“The science and commercial benefits for New Zealand would
flow far beyond sailing. The technologies have wide applications across the
economy in hi-tech manufacturing energy infrastructure, construction and many
other fields.”

In 1936 Michael
Joseph Savage said, “Our objective is to turn New Zealand into a nations of
buyers as well as consumers and to make science, machinery and money the
servants rather than the masters of the people.”

Oram’s column is a 21 century statement of our potential as championed
by Savage. W.B Sutch and Norman Kirk were
people of great vision who have shaped New Zealand. All would no doubt agree
with Oram.

Oram in this most thoughtful and analytical of his columns
wrote, “Auckland must play the same global role in high tech yacht racing not
just for the sake of the America's Cup but to drive science business and wealth
generation in our economy”.

Oram is correct. The challenge for New Zealand Inc is to
come to an understanding, a consensus, and to commit. Government cannot be hands off, but must champion these
industries and have a vision and take Kiwis with them as Norman Kirk did. The government’s challenge is to maximise the
benefits that these technologies can deliver and the industry that can be
built.

In 1939 Michael Joseph Savage said “We cannot leave our
economic and social standards to the fluctuations of overseas trade conditions.
New Zealand must establish our own standards and with these thoughts in our
minds we set out to establish a nation in these southern seas”.

These are the foundations that built our nation. If our leaders champion what Oram has written
we can lift our standards and once again have the potential to provide
have a security that once we all felt.

Wednesday, October 2, 2013

The announcement of the Weymouth affordable housing plan is a overdue but a major step in improving the housing needs in south Auckland and should be applauded .

The sale of State housing in depopulating areas is confusing and may be a lost opportunity . We do have an increasing number of people in need of housing. Many are highly skilled . These people could well have made a real contribution to these communities may of them have lost much social capital and by enticing these skilled folk wound have been of addressing this issue.

A long term durable bi partisan policy is what is lacking and the options for increasing number of our citizens are far from attractive and no one i know wold like this insecurity.

The life for rental tenants is variable. I have been a
landlord. Our tenancy laws provide minimal security and our tax regimes provide
an investment option based not on growth but on tax deductions.
The withdrawal of the state from providing income related
rents and pensioner housing is impacting on all tenants.
There have always been people whose incomes are so low that
home ownership is not a realistic option,
and whose housing needs were provided for. New Zealand is in a minority of western
countries where the state is devolving responsibility for these people. Where
do we think our nurses, bus drivers, fire fighters, pensioners and essential service
folk are going to live?
The shortage of affordable
pensioner housing is critical. Many of the folk who are volunteers and provide
the human infrastructure at our museums and
events are living on fixed incomes with rent consuming most of their pension.
This situation has been
exacerbated with the closing of public health facilities which means these people
are first in the queue for public housing and compete with the working poor and
pensioners. Address these needs by increasing the public housing stock and the housing
problem will largely disappear.